Just blocks from the elegant centre of Turin, once the aristocratic capital of Italy, lies a profoundly different world, one where the faithful turn toward Mecca to say their prayers.
    When evening falls, the streets fill with men chatting in Arabic. They stream into a shabby courtyard where the balconies drip with laundry and into one of the Turin's six Muslim prayer halls. Afterwards, they crowd into le Grand Maghreb cafe around the corner of the couscous.
    By day, women with veiled heads comb the nearby market for bargains or drop into Halal Meats, where the butcher is an imam and the man behind the counter wears a crimson fez.
    Until recently, Turin was known as the home of the House of Savoy, rulers of the Kingdom of Italy, and as the repository of the Shroud of Turin, one of the most revered relics in the Roman Catholic world.
    Profoundly European, profoundly Catholic, this city in the shadow ofthe Alps now finds itself serving as Italy's "laboratory" for immigration and for coexistence between two rival faiths.
    It's a lab where things sometimes boil over.
    The city's Muslim community astonished Italy last fall when thousands marched to demand that women be allowed to wear veils in photos for official identity documents. Veils and heads scarves are not banned in Italy, but a woman's face must be visible in official photos.
    The march spurred a national debate on the rights of Muslims and other immigrants. The debate is new, like the Muslim presence, but both seem destined to grow.
    Italy has one of the lowest birth rates in the world, so low that demographers say it will need millions of new comers to keep the economy afloat. Alarmed, the Pope in February pleaded with Italians to have more babies.
    While bambini are becoming rarer, immigrants are becoming more common. And a third of them are Muslims, many from North African countries like Morocco and Tunisia.
    Italy, a country of 57 million and shrinking, now has about 500,000 Muslims--double the number a decade ago when immigratio was just beginning. Islam has become Italy's second-largest religion.
    The country has three full-fledged mosques, including an imposing, post-modern structure in Rome endowed by the Saudi royal family, and there are more than 130 smaller centres of worship.
    The first baby born in Italy this year--dubbed the "Model 2000 Italian" by one newspaper--was the daughter of Moroccan immigrants. An estimated 10,000 Italians have converted to Islam, many because of marriage.
    All this has struck a chill in the heart of Christendom.
    "Italy has no tradition of immigration," says the Rev Augusto Tino Negri, head of the Turin archdiocese's centre of the study of Islam.
    "And it hasn't had Muslims since the Middle Ages."
    The fear runs deepest inside Italy's Roman Catholic hierachy, the repository of power and influence for centuries.
    "Organised religion as a power structure is nervous about rivals," says James Walston, a political scientist at the American University in Rome.
    Italy is Cathilic by history and culture, but Italians are famously casual about their faith. In contrast, many Muslim immigrants are conspicously devout.
    "Because Italy is a non-religious country, anyone who takes religion seriously is a threat," Mr Walston says.
    In early February, Italy's conference of bishop urged parish priests to discourage Muslim-Christian marriages and told them to stop letting Muslims use Catholic community centres for prayers.
    "We risk giving the impression that Christians do not have a true faith," the conference's spokesman, Monsignor Ennio Antonelli, said.
    Yet there is a growing realisation Muslims are here to stay. Italian political leaders have called for dialogue, integration and understanding.
    Naples offered its MUslim community a site for a mosque and Bologna offered land for a Muslim cemetery. The cities of Palermo and Modena have elected immigrant advisory councils. The little norhtern town of Meduno just adopted a charter embracing cultural diversity--a first for Italy.
    True diversity is still far away.
    Muslims and Christians in Italy live in two distinct worlds. In both worlds, people worry about preserving their culture.
    "We always feel somehowthat we're expected to become like European women," says Malika El Rhatrif, a 32-year-old housewife from Morocco who wears an Islamic headscarf. "People look at us as though we're ignorant, as though we're living in the past."
    Muslim organisations are pushing for Italian schools to offer classes in the Koran and Arabic, and they want public financing for mosques and cultural centres and the right to Muslim holidays at work.
    "we are trying to integrate into this society," says Ahmed Cherkaoui, head of the Islamic institute in Turin.
    "At the same time, we're trying to hold onto our identity."